But there is in the United States a tendency to the other extreme, namely, to insist upon the native right of self-government, holding that the sum of our duty is to set up a civilized form of government and then withdraw from control, leaving the native nation to maintain it. The advocates of such a policy are guilty of a serious oversight in forgetting that “democracy is not simply a form of government, but a state of human evolution.” The native form of government cannot advance far beyond the social life of the people, for they are sustained by the same moral forces. As a matter of fact there is not in the world a single example of a successful native government of a tropical country. Failures are conspicuous on both sides of the Atlantic; for instance, Hayti in the West Indies and Liberia in Africa. The tropical governments of Central and South America are not in any sense native governments, but are administered by a permanently resident foreign community, in their own interest, whose moral standards tend to lower more and more as they mingle with the native populations. A form of native government that would compare with those of civilized nations is by no means possible until the moral forces that have contributed to the highest civilization are operative in their social life. It is evident that the tropical nations if left to themselves will not develop the resources of their country. But it is equally evident that the civilized world will not, and ought not, to leave these resources undeveloped. For civilization depends upon the tropics for many trade products, including india-rubber, and the dependence increases at such a rate that it is predicted that the main lines of commerce in the future will run north and south instead of east and west, and the prediction is not fanciful. It would seem therefore that the development of the resources of the tropics will be by the native under the supervision of the white man. The ideal government will be based upon the clear recognition of mutual need and mutual benefit; and the principle that will mould the form of government and be constantly operative in its administration will be the duty of the civilized nation to bring to the uncivilized its best benefits, to their mutual advantage. The interest of the native himself will be always the first consideration; for he has the first right to the resources of his country and to the reward of his labour; and the interest of the foreign nation second, in the greater sources of supply and the enlarged market for her merchandise.